Extracurricular Activities

Lunchtime Clubs

The school offers a full programme of lunchtime activities to cater for all tastes. In addition to a range of activities in recreational sport, pupils can become involved in any of the following:

Careers Research

ICT

Guitar Club

Traditional Music

Choir

Walking Club

Homework Club

ECO Club

The MAD Group (Making A Difference)

Sports

The sporting extracurricular activities take place at lunchtime and after school. The programmes are led by our own teaching staff. However, from time to time visiting coaching specialists are brought to the school. The team and individual sports covered are:

Athletics

Gymnastics

Skiing

Badminton

Handball *

Soccer *

Basketball *

Hurling *

Swimming

Camogie *

Indoor Bowls *

Table Tennis *

Cross Country

Netball

Tennis

Dance *

Orienteering

Trampolining

Gaelic Football *

Outdoor Pursuits

Walking *

Golf

Educational Visits

A number of educational visits take place at various intervals, including:

A ski trip in the second term of every other year

Outdoor pursuits activity programmes every year

Theatre visits

Art exhibitions

Science exhibitions

Visits to facilitate a range of leisure activities including bowling, ice skating, swimming and hill walking

Annual Ski Trip

Every student has the opportunity to go on the ski trip twice during their time in CPC - once to learn to ski and once to develop their skills.

All year groups have attended over the years, but mostly targeted at KS4 and KS5. The ski trip has mostly travelled to the Haut Lac International Centre in Gstadd, Switzerland. This Year the trip went to a new destination of Folgaria in Italy. The students enjoy skiing, snowboarding, sledging, ice-skating, swimming, 10-pin bowling and have some great snowball fights!

Two past pupils who have enjoyed our school ski trips have since gone on to become ski instructors and have worked in the Alps for several seasons and in The Remarkables in New Zealand.

Music

The Music Department provides excellent facilities for a whole range of musical activities. The extracurricular programme caters for pupils with a wide range of musical tastes and includes:

Senior and Junior Choir

Instrumental Ensemble

Irish Traditional Group

Rock Bands

Individual or small group tuition is available in woodwind and string instruments including guitar. Pupils are entered for Associated Board or Trinity College examinations and are also given opportunities to perform at school concerts and various liturgical services.

Drama

The school's Drama Department is recently established and thriving. Pupils are given opportunities to perform short play extracts and monologues, and to participate in Dance Drama. In addition to this, a school musical is produced every two years - our most recent very successful productions have included:

Heartstart is an initiative which aims to to teach members of the public what to do in the case of a life-threatening emergency.

Pupils are taught how to effectively respond to a range of emergency situations - CPR, suspected heart attack, dealing with choking, serious bleeding and helping someone who may be having a heart attack.

Sports

Camogie

Cross and Passion College has a long history of camogie and competes in Ulster Colleges 'A' competitions at all levels. We are lucky to have a great supply of talented and enthusiastic players from the camogie clubs of North Antrim and also dedicated staff who strive to get the best out of them. Such staff include Mrs Kelly, Miss Dowds, Mrs Scullion and Mrs Black.

We have won numerous Ulster titles and College All-Stars and our greatest achievement came in 2008 when we won the Junior All-Ireland 'A' Colleges title. This was an unbelievable achievement which can hopefully be repeated some day.

This year we have won the Ulster Junior 7-a-side title and reached the All-Ireland Final of this competition.

Hurling

Cross and Passion College has a great tradition of hurling and draws pupils from all of the hurling clubs in North Antrim. CPC enters teams in all Ulster Colleges ‘A’ hurling competitions as follows:

Year 8 - Thompson Cup

Year 9 - McNamee Cup

Year 10 - Gallagher Cup

Year 11 - Year 11 Knockout

Year 12 - Forresters Cup

Year 13 & 14 - Mageean Cup

There are a number of teachers who generously give of their time to coach the school teams, including Mr Cassidy, Mr Kearney, Mr Campbell and Mr Herron.

Hurling has flourished in CPC over the last number of years and we are one of the top hurling colleges in Ulster. This year, CPC were once again crowned All-Ireland Champions when the senior team won the Buggy Cup against Mountrath C.S. from County Laois. This followed on from back to back All-Ireland Titles in 2009 & 2010. This year's final was played in Thurles and the boys produced a fantastic performance to end a magnificent year for them since winning the Mageean Cup back in October. This was the second year in a row we have won the Mageean Cup - a fantastic achievement. Our Year 10s also became Ulster Champions this year when they won the Gallagher Cup. Last year was another successful year for the school winning the Mageean Cup, McNamee Cup and the Thompson Cup.

Hurling in CPC has a bright future due to the dedication of the pupils and teachers involved and the continuing support from local clubs.

Soccer

Soccer teams at Cross and Passion are taken by Mr Kearney and the school competes in the year 8, 9 and 10 competitions in the Coleraine and District Schools league. Opposition varies from Dominican College, Loreto College, Cookstown High, St Mary’s Limavady, Ballymoney High and Dalriada.

The year 8 team competes in the McKinney Cup, the year 9 in the Mc Garry Cup and the year 10 in the Coleraine Cup.

We have been fortunate enough to win some of these trophies in the last few years:

McKinney Cup 2005, 2008, 2009.

McGarry Cup 2008

Coleraine Cup 2006

Gaelic Football

Cross and Passion College competes in the Ulster Colleges competitions. At present we enter two competitions. The teams are coached by Mr Cassidy, Mr McGoldrick, McMcVeigh and Mr Kelly.

Mallon Cup – U-13 ½ “C”

Ennis Cup – U-14 ½ “C”

We have won the Ennis Cup on one occasion, 2012, when we beat Loreto College, Coleraine in the final on a scoreline of 1-10 to 2-4.

Hopefully with continued hard work and dedication we can bring more Ulster Colleges football titles to CPC in the near future.

Netball

Cross and Passion compete in both the Coleraine and District League and the NEBSSA Competitions for Netball. The teams are coached superbly by Ms Donnelly and Mrs S. McGinley. We are consistently competing for titles in these competitions and are have had a number of girls selected for Northern Ireland trials and development squads in recent years.

2015 Results

Year 8 Netball – Finalists in the NEBSSA League and semi-finalists in the Coleraine & District TournamentMinor A Section (Year 9) – Runners up in Coleraine & District LeagueJunior A Section (Year 10) – Runners up in the Coleraine and District LeagueIntermediate B Section (Year 11) – Coleraine & District League WinnersIntermediate A Section (Year 12) – Coleraine & District League WinnersSenior A Section (year 13/14) – Coleraine & District League Winners

Golf

Cross and Passion have a golf team to cater for the pupils who play the sport competitively. Under the guidance of Mrs Black, the pupils take part every year in the Darren Clarke Schools league where they play schools from the local area.

They must firstly sell a minimum of 100 pink badges (£100) for breast cancer. A perk to this is that in June 2012, the pupils were asked to carry the score boards at the Irish Open in Portrush which was a great opportunity.

The team also got the opportunity to play at the K club for a heavily reduced fee and always get the chance to obtain tickets to the Irish Open, wherever it is being held.

Debating in Cross and Passion

Participating in debates and debating competitions has been a long running tradition in Cross and Passion College. Although the current Debating Society has only recently been reinstated by Mrs Hughes along with Mrs McCann, they have achieved great success in this short period of time, including a victory in the regional finals in the "Debating Matters" competition. The successful team included Luíseach Mathers, Orla Donnelly, Sorcha Hughes and Conleth Burns. The group now gets to travel to Glasgow in the new year to continue their participation in the events.

The Debating Society partake in other competitions, such as the "Concern Debates", in which Cross and Passion recently recorded a victory on the 22nd of October against Coleraine Grammar on the motion "The EU can well afford to open their borders to refugees" in which Cross and Passion were opposed to the motion. The team of Sorcha Hughes, Róisín Neill, Bronagh Scullion and Conleth Burns delivered a 2 - 1 victory against their Coleraine rivals.

The debates are a great opportunity to promote literacy within the school and the recent ETI inspection of the school commended the work of the Debating Society in this regard. The tensions that arise during a debate mean that those competing must be able to keep a level head and think clearly under pressure. The members must be able to communicate their arguments, shut down their opponents and time manage their speeches effectively - not an easy task. The team has many upcoming challenges to face; on November 11th they are up against De La Salle, Belfast. This will be followed by debates against St.Mary’s, Magherafelt and St.Louis’, Ballymena.

The current members of the Debating Society are preserving a winning tradition also. In 1986 the Senior Debating Team at Cross and Passion were All-Ireland Champions – a team which featured current Senior teacher Mrs Noleene Magee. It certainly looks like a return to the glory days of debating at CPC is taking place.